Sat 19 Dec 2020
Diary Review: RAYMOND J. HEALY & J. FRANCIS McCOMAS, Editors – Famous Science-Fiction Stories: Adventures in Time And Space, Part 3.
Posted by Steve under Diary Reviews , Science Fiction & Fantasy[11] Comments
RAYMOND J. HEALY & J. FRANCIS McCOMAS, Editors – Famous Science-Fiction Stories: Adventures in Time And Space. The Modern Library G-31; hardcover, 1957, xvi + 997 pages. First published as Adventures in Time in Space, Random House, hardcover, 1946. Bantam F3102, paperback, 1966, as Adventures in Time and Space (contains only 8 stories). Ballantine, paperback, 1975, also as Adventures in Time and Space.
Part 2 can be found here.
ERIC FRANK RUSSELL “Symbiotica.†Novella. Jay Score #3. The title gives the clue to the relationship between the natives and the vegetation of a newly-discovered planet; the idiots sent on the expedition could never grasp anything so obvious. (0)
Update: First published in Astounding Science-Fiction, October 1943. First reprinted in this anthology. First collected in Men, Martians and Machines (Berkley G-148, paperback, 1958). Also reprinted in The Great Science Fiction Stories Volume 5, 1943, edited by Isaac Asimov & Martin H. Greenberg (Daw, paperback, 1981). This story seems has a greater reputation among others than my opinion of it. Russell himself was a very prolific SF writer. This early work doesn’t represent the bulk of his work.
RAYMOND Z. GALLUN “Seeds of the Dusk.†Novelette. When Earth Is Old series #1. Luckily, very little dialogue disturbs this story of Mars’ final conquest of Earth far in the future, letting the description of the plant’s growth from spore to world-wide domination comprise the major part of the story. (4)
Update: First published in Astounding Science-Fiction, June 1938. First reprinted in this anthology. Also reprinted in Tomorrow’s Worlds, edited by Robert Silverberg (Meredith Press, hardcover, 1969), among others. Collected in The Best of Raymond Z. Gallun (Del Rey, paperback, 1978). Gallun certainly qualifies as a “forgotten†writer today, perhaps because he wrote relatively few novels as opposed to several dozen novelettes and short stories.
LEE GREGOR “Heavy Planet.†An inhabitant of a planet with a gravity a hundred times greater than Earth’s discovers a disabled alien spaceship which will solve the problem of space travel. (3)
Update: Lee Gregor was a pen name of Milton A. Rothman. “Heavy Planet†was first published in Astounding Science-Fiction, August 1939. First reprinted in this anthology. Also reprinted in The Expert Dreamers, edited by Frederik Pohl (Doubleday, hardcover, 1962). Collected in Heavy Planet and Other Science Fiction Stories (Wildside Press, softcover, 2004). For some reason I remember more of this story than some of the others in this anthology that I’ve reported on so far.
TO BE CONTINUED...
December 19th, 2020 at 3:17 pm
I was impressed with “Heavy Planet†too, after reading it some years back. Wondered if it could have influenced Hal Clement’s later MISSION OF GRAVITY.
December 19th, 2020 at 4:06 pm
MISSION OF GRAVITY is another Golden Age classic, one I enjoyed immensely at the time it came out. That Hal Clement was influenced by “Heavy Planet” is almost a sure thing. He absolutely had to have read it.
December 19th, 2020 at 5:37 pm
“Heavy Planet” was also published in the anthology “Where Do We Go from Here?”, 1972, edited by Asimov. Perhaps this is why you remember it? It’s why I remember it.
December 19th, 2020 at 6:24 pm
No, I’m sure the only time I read the story was in this Healy-McComas anthology, and that was over 50 years ago! I didn’t know about the Asimov collection, but I don’t try to list them all in my update comments. Good to know that Asimov was impressed by this one too.
December 19th, 2020 at 9:01 pm
Frederik Pohl was the unacknowledged co-writer of “Heavy Planet.” Well, unacknowledged until about 2004.
December 19th, 2020 at 10:39 pm
Thanks, Jerry. I’m sure I saw that somewhere myself, but I’d forgotten it and didn’t follow up on it now in my Update for the story.
From the online SF Encyclopedia: “Besides books of popular science, Rothman wrote a small number of sf stories both under his own name and as by Lee Gregor, most of which involve space travel. Twelve were published in his lifetime. The first two Gregor stories were revised by Frederik Pohl, his agent at the time.”
“Heavy Planet” was the first of these two, and Gregor/Rothman’s first published story.
http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/rothman_milton_a
December 19th, 2020 at 9:02 pm
Gallun is certainly forgotten, but was remembered enough to get a BEST OF collection from Ballantine.
December 19th, 2020 at 10:43 pm
Yes, he was apparently considered good enough to be worthy of a BEST OF collection, but that was over 40 years ago. I’m willing to contend that anyone younger than that now has never heard of him.
I do have the book. I really ought to dig it out.
December 20th, 2020 at 12:55 am
A problem for all SF from the past is the Future doesn’t date very well. I suspect that will be true for contemporary SF as well.
It’s ironic that a SF story from the Classic era can at times be more dated than a Western, Mystery, or Historical novel from the same period.
December 20th, 2020 at 9:51 am
Perfected stated, David. “… the Future doesn’t date very well.” I like that!
January 15th, 2021 at 7:08 pm
[…] Part 3 can be found here. […]